


Bottom of the Pyramid

by breathewords



Category: Riverdale (TV 2017)
Genre: Angst, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Missing Scene, and other season 2 madness, how i get through bughead breakups, post-episode, protect jughead jones 2k18
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-13
Updated: 2018-05-13
Packaged: 2019-05-06 00:08:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,387
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14629905
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/breathewords/pseuds/breathewords
Summary: Missing scenes I wrote to get us through Bughead breakups and other Season 2 madness. Kind of a follow up to "Below the Fold" in terms of outtakes, but you don’t have to read them together.





	Bottom of the Pyramid

**Season Two, Chapter 18**

He feels his lip split, tastes blood, and he almost thanks Archie for what he said minutes earlier. If Jughead hadn’t been agonizing over those words, he might have had a harder time resisting the urge to defend himself, and self-preservation is not the purpose of the final phase of Serpent initiation.

_She doesn’t want to see you anymore._

Betty. Her name spins in his head. He can’t hold onto it. He thinks he might have a concussion. He couldn’t hold onto her.

_She’s been wanting to break up with you for weeks._

Betty. Her name like a punch to the gut. Or maybe it really was a fist that knocked the wind out of him. He can’t tell. And in the end, does it really make a difference? He ends up on his hands and knees, gasping for breath anyway.

_She’s been agonizing over it._

Loving her is agony, just like the hard-toed boot that connects with his ribcage. He doesn’t know how it happened. It wasn’t supposed to happen. Falling in love with Betty Cooper wasn’t part of the plan. But she roped him in with her quick wit and quicker instincts, her soft ponytail and softer voice, only when she was trying to be quite. Like when she said his name. Like it was worth something. Like he was worth something.

_Since you crossed to the dark side, she couldn’t bring herself to do it._

But he isn’t. Riverdale High feels a million miles away. He closes his eyes for a second, just for a second, not long enough for anyone to think he’s down for the count, and lets the darkness take over. Then, suppressing a moan, he drags himself to his feet.It doesn’t matter how hard the Serpents punch him. He doesn’t matter. Archie knows it, Betty knows it, hell, even his own mother knows it. None of them want him.

_She saw where you were headed, Jughead. We all did._

He leans into the next blow like it’s a warm hug.They all knew it. He was fated to end up like this, and he was kidding himself thinking he could ever be with a girl like Betty Cooper. He even told her as much on the night of his birthday. He’s a burned-out loner from the wrong side of the tracks, and she’s a shining star that keeps getting brighter and brighter. Stars explode behind his eyes as someone lands a punch on his temple, but he’s still too busy reeling over Archie’s words to do more than stagger a few steps after being hit.

_She knows you can’t be with them and with her._

The brass knuckles finally knock him off balance once more. He can’t be with her. He spits a mouthful of blood into the grass and feels sick. The sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach has nothing to do with the beating he’s taking. No more blows come, although he wishes they would. He chose this, but there was never really any choice, was there? The Serpents are his family. It was never going to be any other way. Betty and Archie and even Veronica were nothing but a brief respite from reality, a delusion he was stupid enough to fool himself into thinking would last. Betty knew it wouldn’t. He guesses she finally got tired of slumming it with him, just like he said she would. Everyone always gets tired of him one way or another.

When he pulls on the leather jacket, he’s deaf to the rowdy applause of the Serpents. By the time his ears stop ringing with the sound of her voice, the crowd around him has cleared, and he’s alone in the grass field. He tilts his head up to the sky, clasps his hands behind his head, and takes deep breaths of the early summer air until he finally starts to regain some feeling. His face is raw and his ribs bruised, but for the most part, he remains numb. Good. It’s better that way. He’s always known it.

Somehow, he drags himself home. When he catches a glimpse of himself in the bathroom mirror, he sees his shirt is covered in blood. He’s reminded of the night Fred Andrews was shot, and Archie held vigil outside his father’s operating room, oblivious to the state of his clothing. Archie went home, and when he returned to the hospital, hand in hand with Veronica, fresh and clean, it was to hoards of friends, and a father that would soon come home to his son.

For Jughead, there’s no more girlfriend to clean him up. No friends telling him it’ll be okay. No chance of seeing his father walk through the door any time soon. No mother to give him reassuring smiles, no sister to make him laugh.

So he puts himself back together alone, just like he always has.

 

* * *

 

**Season Two, Chapter 19-20**

Jughead hasn’t spoken since Betty replaced Archie in the passenger seat of the car he borrowed from one of the other Serpents for the sake of the drag race, but she can tell that he’s still fuming. She doesn’t blame him.

“Jug,” she tries, wanting to say a million things at once.

Wanting to tell him how happy she is he came out uninjured and alive. Wanting to apologize for the weakness that’s responsible for pushing her to send Archie to break up with Jughead when she should have just done it herself. Wanting to explain she knows she was stupid for letting the Black Hood puppet-master her to begin with. She guesses she should explain that’s the reason why she (Archie) broke up with him first. In true Jughead fashion, he’s ranting before she can.

“Betty, I swear to god, if you try to defend Archie right now, I’m going to lose it. Is that why you’re here? Or is it just to torture me? Because Archie said you want nothing to do with me. And I got the message. Loud and clear.”

Why is she here? Why’d she get in the car? She thinks back, remembers hearing sirens, thinking immediately of ambulances, of Jughead and Archie dead in a car wreck, clinging to Veronica and holding her breath until their car skidded around the corner, wanting to separate them as they yelled, two of the most important people in her life, and then getting in Jughead’s car without a word. Because it just felt natural. Because she wanted to calm him down.

“I just wanted to make sure you were alright,” she says, fighting to keep her voice even.

He throws his head back and laughs, but there’s no humor in his voice.

“I’m not alright, Betty! You broke up with me! I joined a gang! God, none of this was supposed to happen.”

“Jug, please let me explain. I want to explain why I did what I did. It’s not what you think. I promise.”

He pulls into Sunnyside, still gripping the wheel with white knuckles. Betty covers his hand with hers, and he doesn’t move, but she shifts the car into park before he can bring himself to look at her.

“Can I come in?”

He nods, eyes softening a little at her pleading expression.

She steels herself for the conversation they’re about to have and says a prayer that he accepts her excuses and apologies.

“I _never_ wanted to break up with you,” she says when they’re standing awkwardly in front of his couch.

“You didn’t. Archie did.”

His pain is palpable in his eyes and in his voice, and it’s not until then that she realizes what she did. Archie’s not just her best friend. He’s Jughead’s brother. He’s one of the few people Jughead trusts. He’s the guy who Jughead grew up watching shine while he was cast aside. He’s the guy Betty spent years pining after when she should have been looking at Jughead. Of course he makes Jughead insecure.

“I should never have sent him. It was a mistake. I … I’m sorry,” she says, and tears start rolling down her cheeks despite her best efforts to keep them at bay.

He shoves his hands awkwardly in the pockets of his leather jacket. They have a mind of their own sometimes, especially when it comes to Betty, and he doesn’t want to let himself comfort her right now.

“The Black Hood was calling me,” she finally blurts. “Blackmailing me. And I let it go on because he wasn’t killing anyone. He wanted me to cut ties with everyone I care about. My mom, Veronica, you. He threatened you. Said he’d do it for me if I didn’t do it myself.”

She’s staring at the wall, frighteningly still, and he frees his hands from their confines in his pockets as soon as she collapses on the couch, head in her hands.

“I should have … stopped taking his calls … shouldn’t have listened … should have reported him to Sheriff Keller … should have told you,” she’s trying to say between gasps for air, and suddenly he feels horrible for not seeing that something was off with her, for being selfishly wrapped up in his own problems, for accepting Archie’s explanation so quickly.

“Hey, Betty, stop. It’s okay. Just breathe. You don’t have to explain anymore, okay?”

She ducks her head against his chest and he rubs soothing circles against her back until she regains her Cooper composure.

“I really am sorry for how I handled all of this, Jug. I don’t wanna do this anymore. I don’t want to stay away from you. I can’t. I love you.”

“I love you too, Betts. Just … stop apologizing, okay? Obviously, all of this is really messed up. I just wish I could have been there for you sooner. But we’ll figure it out. Together.”

She nods and wraps her arms around his waist, pressing herself further into his side, and he plants a kiss on the crown of her head.

“I don’t wanna leave,” she says.

“So don’t.”

She doesn’t. She reads half a book, head resting on his thigh. He beats his writers block for the first time in a long time. They order Chinese takeout and talk about everything but the Black Hood, the Serpents, the monsters in their closest. And it’s cleansing. They both need the break.

It’s pitch black outside when Betty finally starts to doze off.

“Hey,” Jughead says, nudging her gently.

“Hm,” she mumbles back.

“You want a ride home?”

She shakes her head.

“Can I stay?”

He just smiles and leads her to his bed.

She doesn’t have any nightmares.

When he wakes up the next morning, it’s to the sight of her asleep in his t-shirt, wrapped in his arms, hair mused adorably. He’s still in a gang and his dad is still in jail and his best friend still has them in deep shit with the wrong people. But somehow, he feels like everything will work itself out.

 

* * *

 

**Season 2, Chapter 22-23**

Jughead can’t sleep. His dad’s comment sticks with him even after FP heads out for the night (AA didn’t really take, not after the botched “retirement” party and subsequent drug runs for Penny Peabody and day after day of seeing his son fall in deeper with the Serpents).

It sticks with him through the night, through the days of winter break that follow, through Christmas Eve and the failure that was his dad’s weak attempt to make amends with the other half of his family and head to Toledo for the holiday. Through dropping off presents for his sister at the post office, to be delivered well after Christmas Day instead of in person.

And if he can’t see his mom and sister, all the more reason to make a trip that’s actually feasible. 

_“You maybe wanna swing by later? Say thanks in person?”_

FP had offered, and he had refused, but he really should go thank Betty for the typewriter. She deserves more than a text, and as self-deprecating as he can be, he doesn’t like to think of himself as being a coward. If nothing else, well, he does try to be polite. Especially toward pretty blondes who smell like sunshine.

It’s not until after he’s braving the winter weather with nothing but a leather jacket on his back (it’s the warmest one he owns) that he realizes it’s almost midnight and showing up at his ex-girlfriend’s house might not be the best idea.

He starts to turn around, to go back to the trailer, but he really doesn’t want to. Doesn’t want to deal with another night of piling on blanket after blanket because it’s freezing and the heater’s broken and he sleeps on a couch right next to the door. Doesn’t want to deal with pulling off his father’s shoes because he’s blacked out again. Doesn’t want to wake up with a stiff neck and the strange feeling that he’s somehow missing a limb, missing _something_.

The feeling that’s been with him all winter break. Since before Christmas, really. Since he broke up with Betty. He reminds himself for the millionth time that that it was for her own good, and probably for his, too. He was stupid to let himself fall so hard for her. At a certain point, he realized it was too late to stop. Realized that there was no easy out for either of them, even though she deserved one. So he’d tried to pull the emergency break. It should have saved him the heartache he went through when she sent Archie to break up with him because of the Black Hood’s threats, but he still wakes up every morning with her name on his lips and an ache in his chest that’s more than his usual angst.

He tries to shut off his brain and pick up his pace, and before he knows it, he’s grabbing the ladder he knows Hal stores in the unlocked garden shed, propping it against her window, and climbing up. His brain turns on again when he’s made it to the top, swaying slightly in the late December wind, barely making out Betty’s sleeping form.

What is he doing? He can’t just climb in her window in the middle of the night. Especially not now that they’re no longer dating. He’s about to climb back down to earth when she moves. It’s slight at first, he only catches it because he was starting so intently, but before he can turn away, she’s jerking more violently and then she’s thrashing and shouting and he doesn’t really have any control over his body as he pries open her unlocked window and launches himself inside.

Before he reaches her bed he stops himself, realizing that technically, he has just broken into Betty’s bedroom while she’s asleep, and grabbing her in the middle of what clearly is a bad case of night terrors could do more harm than good. But now that he’s here, he can’t leave.

He tries whispering her name, which obviously does no good. She stops flailing so much, but he can make out beads of sweat running down her temples and hears her whispering some sort of pleas for mercy. He decides to just get it over with, because more likely than not she’ll freak out even more if she wakes up on her own and sees him standing there.

“Betty,” he says, sitting on her bed.

She flinches and her eyelids flutter.

“Betty, hey. It’s me. It’s Jughead.”

He gently shakes her shoulder and she flies up, chest heaving, staring at him with unblinking eyes.

“Juggie?”

“You were having a nightmare.”

It’s the only explanation he offers, and she doesn’t ask for more. She just falls into his chest and does that silent cry that he only recognizes because he’s been here with her before.

“How’d you get in my room?” She asks after what feels like either an eternity or a millisecond with her in his arms.

“Used your dad’s ladder. You should probably start locking your window.”

Her eyes get wide again at the realization that she didn’t secure her room before going to sleep, and he’s quick to console her.

“Hey, don’t worry. I’m the only one crazy enough to break in. Trust me.”

Her forehead creases and she suddenly pulls away, crossing her arms across her chest as she repositions herself against her headboard. Jughead turns at the waist so his back is to her, keeping his feet firmly planted on the floor. Everything else is up in the air.

“Why are you here?”

Her voice is cold.

“I wanted to thank you for the typewriter.”

“In the middle of the night?”

“I thought you might be awake.”

“Jughead, why are you here? You … you broke up with me.”

“I just wanted…” he starts.

“Can you at least look at me?”

He turns again and tells her that he needed to keep her safe. That he never wanted to hurt her. That she was right when she called things off for the first time. That she deserves more. That Penny threatened her because of _him_ , that his father is falling off the wagon again because of _him_ , that he ruins everything and everyone and she can’t be a casualty of the train wreck that is his life. He stops himself short of telling her he still loves her, that he’ll always love her.

“So we’re still trying to make it stick?” She asks, throwing his words back at him.

“I’m having a harder time with it than anticipated.”

She laughs once, a dismissive sound that knots his stomach.

“You thought it wouldn’t be hard? You thought we could just … what? Stop talking? Stop seeing each other? Stop caring all together? Earth to Jughead, it’s damn near impossible.”

“I know,” he says, head ducked. “God, I know. I shouldn’t have come over. I’m so sorry, Betty."

He thanks her for the typewriter as an afterthought and makes it halfway out the window before she pulls an about face and stops him.

“Jug?”

“Yeah?”

“Do you think we could call a timeout? Just for the night? In the morning, we could go back to trying to make it stick.”

He keeps one foot on the top rung of the ladder, unsure. He knows what she’s asking is masochistic for the both of them, but he also can’t deny that spending even a few more minutes alone with her is an offer he’s finding incredibly hard to refuse.

“It’s just … I haven’t been sleeping well. And I’ve always slept really well with you. I just want to be able to close my eyes without seeing … Please, Juggie.”

He’s got his arm around her shoulder in record time after that.

“You’re not mad at me?” He asks a few minutes later, shoes off, dark jeans in stark contrast with the pink comforter he sits on, Betty curled into his side where they both know she belongs. 

“No. I’m just … sad.”

“Me, too,” he says.

After that, neither of them says much of anything.

 

* * *

 

**Season 2, Chapter 29-30**

“Jug, what’s up,” Betty says, phone cradled between her shoulder and ear as she exits Pop’s, to-go bags in hand.

“I’m starving, Betty, that’s what’s up.”

She catches the subtle notes of humor in his voice, but it’s also falling a little flat.

“I know. That’s why I’m on my way with takeout from Pop’s. You know I support you, Juggie, but it’s officially time I insist you eat something.”

“My dad beat you to it. He showed up with about a dozen burgers last night, and I couldn’t resist.”

“Thank God. I was starting to get worried.”

“Don’t worry about me, Cooper. Just meet me at my place with that takeout.”

“Your place? Jug…”

“Yeah, just get here, okay?”

She picks up her pace after that, knowing something serious had to have happened for him to give up his post at Southside High.

“You look awful,” she says when he swings open the door, wet from the rain and even more gaunt looking than when he was living in a projection booth. Surely a combination of his futile battle against food and whatever has happened to take the wind out of his sails as he tried to save his former school.

“I still love you?” Betty quickly amends.

He accepts her apology immediately, because she has food and she’s kissing him, and how can he stay mad at those puppy-dog eyes looking up at him from under rain-coated lashes?

“You’re shivering,” she says, walking him backward toward the couch and reaching for the tattered blanket draped over the back of it. “What’s going on, Jug?”

“Hiram finally got fed up with my antics, I guess. Sent his right hand to cut the chains.”

“Archie?”

“The one and only. We’re not exactly on the greatest terms right now.”

“Same with me and Veronica,” Betty says, tucking her feet up onto the couch and her head under Jughead’s chin. “So what happened? You just … walked away?”

“It was a peaceful protest, Betts. We got some attention. That was the point. Not to pick a fight with Archie and the wrestling team.”

She wraps her arms around his waist as he reaches for the food she brought over, hating the way he pulls away from her as he leans over to the coffee table.

“Think they’re really gonna do it?” She asks.

“Yeah, I think so. I’m trying to make my peace with it. I didn’t even really go there for that long.”

“I know. But I get it. This is where you’re from. It’s where you bonded with the other Serpent kids. And you never exactly fit in at Riverdale High.”

She knows he’d never take offense to that. She also knows he doesn’t want to justify his passion for Southside High. He doesn’t have to, at least not around her. Despite what other people might think, Jughead picks his battles. Sure, he picks many, but they all matter to him. His capacity for righteousness is just one of the reasons why Betty loves him.

“I guess Riverdale High isn’t all bad,” Jughead says.

“Right answer.”

He coughs once into his elbow, then for about another five minutes straight before Betty says, “That’s it, I’m getting the cough medicine.”

To no one’s surprise, the Jones’s don’t have cough medicine, so Betty goes back out to buy some.

“Just stay,” Jughead complains.

“I told you you’d make yourself sick, sitting out there in the rain. You didn’t listen. So now you’re gonna sit here alone while I go to the drugstore.”

“Can I at least watch TV, mom?” Jughead jokes.

“No,” Betty says, trying to keep her tone harsh. “Just sit there and eat your dinner and think about what you’ve done.”

When Betty lets herself back into the trailer 15 minutes later, Jughead has not turned on the TV, but he is pacing in front of it. His head snaps up when he hears Betty come in.

“Okay, I know I said I’d said my goodbyes to Southside High, but maybe that’s just an excuse. Maybe I’m giving up. Maybe I failed. I should have done more. I can still. Hiram Lodge will not get away with this. I…”

Betty cuts him off with her lips on his.

“Shut up, Jug, and come here.”

She leads him over to the couch, pushing him down in front of it so she can massage his shoulders from behind.

“You did all you could. You drew attention to an important issue and you got the other Serpents involved in some activism. I wouldn’t call that nothing.”

He sighs, and it brings on another round of coughing. She can tell he’s still _thinking_ , still trying to work out a way to bend the will of a powerful millionaire from the floor of his trailer.

“Jughead, do you think you can turn off your brain for a minute?”

He closes his eyes and drops his head back onto her knees.

“Okay,” he whispers.

“Good. Just… let me make sure you’re okay. For my sake.”

She makes him choke down the cough syrup before picking at his fries.

“One more thing,” he says.

He asks her to be his running mate in the student council election, and she agrees without hesitation. Because she needs him to be quite and let his throat recover. Because supporting him feels natural. Because she was excited about running with Veronica, and knows Jughead will probably give her more of a platform for her own ideas than she ever would have had on Team Lodge.

Because together, they can take on anyone. Even Veronica and Archie.

 

* * *

 

**Season 2, Chapter 34**

Sure, they can take on anyone, but not everyone all at once. They both crack under the pressure of Riverdale’s very own reckoning, finally colliding in the burning streets.

Betty has just found out her father is a serial killer who’s been torturing her personally for months. Attacking her friends. Killing her classmates. Tearing her relationships apart. Calling her relentlessly and giving her nightmares she’ll likely never shake from her subconscious.

Jughead has just learned Fangs, his friend and Serpent brother, will never laugh again. Will never throw a punch again. Will never lay a hand on his shoulder again. Will never bring up the rear of their motorcycle brigade again. Will never beat him at pool again.

They’re both running for their lives. As always, they run straight into each other. Betty doesn’t look up when her face smacks his shoulder. She doesn’t have to. She feels his soft flannel and smells his familiar scent and knows immediately, amid the chaos, she has somehow found Jughead. She buries her face in his jacket, breathing in the smell of leather instead of smoke, trying not to cry.

He doesn’t even try. As soon as he feels her in his arms, he knows it’s useless. He’s crumbling under the weight of his guilt, his responsibility, his life, and he can’t take the pressure. He folds in on himself like a blackhole, surely sucking Betty in with him. He can’t do anything right. So he just cries. He can’t even be a gang member right. He holds Betty around the shoulders like he can hold her together. He can’t.

When she feels him shaking in her arms, she knows she’s not the only one who’s suffered a trauma tonight, and for the first time, she curses their god forsaken hometown. She hates Riverdale for what it’s done to Jughead, to Cheryl, to Midge, to everyone. She wants to say something to him. To ask what’s wrong. To take away his pain. But she has too much of her own. She can’t.

They end up at the trailer by some unspoken agreement. Betty’s house is certainly not an option. Pop’s could be on fire for all they know. In the streets, they pass familiar faces, making Betty flinch violently, all of them reminding her of her father. Jughead stiffens and ducks his head at the unfamiliar faces, Ghoulies out for his blood. Maybe they deserve it. When they tumble through the door, they’re both so tense, they can barely unlock their jaws to talk.

Betty manages it first, her voice coming out more raspy and uneven than ever before.

“My father is … the Black Hood.”

She chokes on the last words and slides down against the wall opposite the door, unable to make it five feet to the couch.

“Fangs is dead,” Jughead says, voice soft and toneless.

He closes his eyes, but it only makes the fires burn brighter. All he sees is that bullet entering Fangs’s stomach. Fangs’s blood on Jughead’s hands. _His fault._  

Betty feels him hit the floor immediately around the corner, and her hand finds his, which is pressed firmly to the floor. She intertwines their fingers, spreading blood all over the back of his hand, unable to find it in herself to care.

She loses track of time before he speaks up again.

“Let’s just do it, Betts. Run away like we said we would. This town is literally burning to the ground. We’re gonna die here, Betts.”

And then he’s on his hands and knees in front of her, tears still carving paths down his cheeks, literally begging her to leave Riverdale with him. She knows he’s right. Staying means certain death. She chokes down her own tears for the millionth time that night and agrees.

They get on his motorcycle without another word and make it an hour passed Centerville before stopping for gas. She leans into him and closes her eyes, completely spent. When her ringtone blares through the crisp night air, she thinks she’s dreaming, and jumps so violently she almost knocks the motorcycle over.

“Who is it?” Jughead asks, voice laced with the fear she feels coursing through her.

“Archie,” she breathes.

Then, she promptly shuts off her phone. Jughead sighs as he replaces the pump.

“I’ll text him to let him know we’re okay,” he says.

“Are we?”

“Betty…”

“Never mind. Can we just find somewhere to sleep?”

“Sure, Betts.”

Her question bounces around in his head as they head back off in search of a motel he can afford. Are they alright? He wants them to be. He wants it so bad. Especially for her. She deserves to be happy, to have a nice, peaceful life. Instead, she’s shivering on the back of his motorcycle, stuck with him while he runs away. He can’t give her what he deserves. Can’t save Fangs. Can’t fill his father’s shoes. Can’t be enough for his mother. Can’t be a role model to his baby sister. Can’t keep Toni safe without help from Cheryl. Can’t do anything to protect the people he loves.

By the time they climb off the motorcycle, stiff and bone tired, his fingers are itching to dial up Hiram Lodge. To make him an offer he can’t refuse. To sign his own death warrant. He loves Betty, he really does, but tonight, even that’s not enough. He’s ready to lay down his life. Especially if it means no more Serpents have to die. Especially if it’ll set Betty free. Especially if it’s the only way he can be of use.

“I love you,” he tells her when they close the door and collapse on the moth-eaten sheets of the motel’s only free twin bed. “So much.”

She kisses him and her eyes are still dry. She won’t cry tonight. She’ll dig her nails in and she’ll be strong. Be strong for her mother, who’s already suffered so much. For Archie, who, like her, just wants to keep his family safe. For Midge and Fangs’s family and friends. For everyone who is mourning.

For Jughead, who’s got a heart bigger than anyone she knows. Who’s somehow giving her strength when he has none left to give.

She kisses him and tries to crush her own demons between their bodies. To tamp them down. _To do better._

When he pushes into her, for once, neither of them makes a sound. No moans. No declarations of love. No _yes, Betty_ ’s or _faster, Juggie_ ’s. He clasps her hands on the mattress above their heads and looks at her like he’ll never see her again.

There’s blood on the mattress. Blood on her hands. On his clothes. Behind his eyes. Everywhere. He fucks her like it’s the last thing he’ll ever do.

She falls asleep wrapped more thoroughly around him than he thought humanly possible. Her legs are locked around his waist and her arms hug his neck. As her breathing evens out, his heartbeat quickens. He’s not going to be able to leave her.

Eventually, she jolts in her sleep like he knew she would. He was almost asleep himself, and throws himself out of the bed, half in shock and half of his own accord.

Before he can think twice, he’s punching the phone icon next to Hiram’s contact. Promising his life in exchange for peace between the Serpents and the Ghoulies. Saying goodbye to Betty and driving straight back into hell.

Feeling at peace for the first time in a long time. Pretty soon, it’ll all be over.

**Author's Note:**

> Bottom of the Pyramid is in reference to the inverted pyramid, which is like the first thing you learn in journalism school. It means news articles are supposed to be written with the most important info at the top. One of the reasons is because copy editors used to just start cutting straight from the bottom of stories if they were too long for the print layout. It doesn’t happen so much anymore because everything is online, but the principle still applies. I like to think of these as the scenes that were cut from the bottom of the story, and since Betty and Jug are lil reporters, I think it works :)


End file.
